


Food Poisoning

by Bluewolf458



Category: The Sentinel (TV)
Genre: Gen, Sentinel Thursday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:55:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28172028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: Jim and Blair are feeling sick
Relationships: Jim Ellison & Blair Sandburg
Kudos: 7





	Food Poisoning

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Sentinel Thursday prompt 'feeling'

Food Poisoning

by Bluewolf

Jim didn't feel well when he wakened. His head ached and he felt sick.

God, no. He didn't have time to be ill!

It was a struggle to remember everything he had to do that day... there were three witnesses to a kidnapping he had to interview, not that he expected any of them to have seen anything of value - they had been too far from the abduction of the child for the kidnappers to even realize they'd been seen. And he was due in court that day as well, though he didn't expect to be held up for long there; not that that necessarily meant much, sometimes an apparently straightforward trial dragged on for longer than anyone expected. Despite his malaise, he smiled slightly as he remembered one case where his partner had been called to testify, and in response to one question had expounded at length on the anthropological details of the incident the defence lawyer had queried. Bad question; by wording it so that Blair had been given the opportunity to do that, the lawyer had actually had his client found guilty.

After that, if he had time, he would have reports to write; reports he would have to do personally because his partner hadn't been there to see what had happened.

Jim sighed, and forced himself out of bed. Lying there feeling sorry for himself was accomplishing nothing. Even though he was sick, those things had to be done that day.

He paused at the top of the stair. Such a long way down... The unfamiliar thought startled him. He took a deep breath, gripped the handrail firmly, for once needing it for balance, and made his way downstairs.

Once in the bathroom, he fumbled the top off the bottle of Tylenol, dry swallowed two of the tablets, pissed, washed and shaved. His stomach was still rebelling and just as he decided to forego breakfast, he found himself bent over the toilet. The tablets he had swallowed just minutes earlier made a reappearance along with some bile.

Jim took another two tablets from the bottle of Tylenol, headed for the kitchen and washed them down with a glass of water. Then he switched on the coffee maker. He didn't want anything to eat, but thought that some coffee might settle his stomach.

He poured himself a mug of black coffee and took a mouthful. His stomach behaved and he took a second mouthful just as Blair stumbled out of his room.

Jim looked at his friend, and noted that Blair looked as miserable as Jim himself felt.

"Chief?"

Blair blinked at him. "God, Jim, you look as bad as I feel!"

"Sick? Headache?"

"Yes... "

"Odd." Jim took another mouthful of coffee, glad that it wasn't threatening to make an immediate reappearance. He thought for a moment, then went on, "I don't like doing it, but I'm going to call in sick. There are some things I should be doing, including giving evidence in court. But I don't think I'd be able to concentrate on anything today."

"That's not like you," Blair commented as he reached for the Tylenol.

"Take them with water," Jim said. "I dry swallowed the first two and threw them up again almost before they hit my stomach."

Blair nodded and obeyed. He put the Tylenol bottle back, went to the kitchen, took a glass of water and washed the tablets down. Then he reached for the coffee and poured himself a mug. He finished it and stumbled back towards the bathroom.

Jim glanced at the clock and picked up the phone. Simon would be in the office by now.

"Banks."

"Simon, it's Jim. I won't be in today. I know I'm supposed to be giving evidence in court but - "

"Sick?" Simon asked.

"And a headache I wouldn't sell you."

"Join the club," Simon said. "Rafe, Brown and Donnelly have all called in sick already this morning. They caught me before I left home. How's Sandburg?"

"He's sick too."

"I'm going to get Forensics to check the last two or three sandwiches left in the breakroom," Simon decided. "Though I'd have expected you to know if any of them were tainted in any way."

Jim frowned, thinking back to the previous day's sandwiches in the vending machine. "One of the sandwiches had a fairly strong-tasting sauce rather than mayo," he said. "But it was quite nice... I suppose the sauce could have masked any 'this doesn't taste quite right' in the sandwich. Everyone else is okay?"

"Megan had lunch at Carson's, yesterday, on her way back from giving a talk about safety at one of the schools. I'd a meeting with Chief Warren and Commissioner Duncan and we ended up going out for lunch too. The others all brought in a packed lunch... "

Jim nodded to himself, thinking that he would be doing the same for a while.

Meanwhile, Simon was saying, "I'll let the court know... "

***

Forensics tracked down the problem to the meat in one of the sandwiches - the one with the strong-tasting sauce.

It turned out that there was a pretty high incidence of food poisoning in Cascade that day, and all the victims had bought a ham sandwich from a vending machine. And for some weeks thereafter, nobody in the city bought a ham sandwich anywhere... and some of the more paranoid citizens didn't buy ham either.

While the company that provided the sandwiches quietly changed its supplier, and bought its meat from a rival source... although it did let its customers know what it'd done. The last thing it wanted was for its customers to assume that it would ever be lax about food safety.


End file.
